“Uh-huh.” Opal began to sweat. What if her mom discovered she’d snuck out?
“Who were they? Do I know their parents?”
“Just some kids from school,” Opal said quickly. “One of them was Logan.”
For the first time, his name didn’t make her mother smile. Mrs. Walsh examined the bike tracks running down the sidewalk. “What were you doing?”
“Practicing our talents. There’s still going to be a pageant, right?”
“I don’t know.” Mrs. Walsh’s voice broke. Her gaze shifted to Mr. Murphy. She walked over to the old man, putting a hand on his shoulder and leaning in to say something.
“Psst. Opal!”
Opal looked behind her. Nico, Emma, Tyler, and Logan were bunched next to the battered stage. Emma waved her over. “Come on.”
Opal shot a quick glance at her mom before hurrying to join her friends. “What’s up?”
“My movie debut got cancelled,” Emma said glumly. “The projection equipment is smashed, and that’s gonna cost a fortune.”
“All this carnage is expensive,” Tyler said. “I bet they have to cancel the festival now. They’re not gonna spend money on new radish banners when the streetlights need fixing.”
“Can we imagine gold coins inside the Darkdeep?” Emma suggested. “That’d solve a lot of problems.”
“Until they all disappeared,” Nico reminded her. “What good would that do?”
“I don’t think it would work anyway.” Tyler shoved his hands in his pockets. “Inanimate objects haven’t come out of the Darkdeep. Even that chicken nugget was rolling around.”
“The figments were definitely animate last night.” Opal shuddered. “And they lasted forever. I wish there was some trick to make them disappear.”
“Yeah, about that.” Nico scuffed his shoe on the pavement. “I might’ve done something to make the Sasquatch vanish.”
“What?” the others blurted in unison. It would have been funny if everything weren’t such a mess.
“When Bigfoot picked me up, I … I talked to it.” He shrugged self-consciously. “I said I was sorry and asked it not to kill me.”
“So you begged for your life.” Logan snorted derisively. “What, you think it felt bad for you and dissolved itself out of pity?”
Opal cringed, but Nico didn’t take the bait.
“No, not like that.” He chewed his bottom lip, his eyes getting a faraway look. “I felt something … change. I wasn’tafraid for a second. Up close like that, I could see how much the Sasquatch didn’t belong there.”
No one spoke. The wind whipped shredded strips of canvas across the mangled grass.
“So we just, like … apologize?” Tyler said finally. “To the figments?”
Nico’s features bunched as he shook his head. “No, that’s not it. But … I don’t know.”
“We bring the figments into being,” Emma said. “It makes sense you connected with one.”
Logan crossed his arms. “What are you saying? We should tell these monsters we love them?”
“Be serious, Logan.” Opal pressed her hands together, thinking. “Maybe it was the way you looked at the Sasquatch, Nico. How you reallysawit.”
Tyler grunted. “We’re supposed to have staring contests?”
“No,” Opal snapped, growing frustrated. “I just meant that Nico paying closer attention to the problem might be part of the solution.”
“If he did anything at all,” Logan muttered.
